Jerzy ficowski biography channel

Although texts about Gypsies had been written in Poland earlier, Ficowski was first to find the way into their community. Thanks to this, he was able to go beyond the stereotypical context of campfires, fortune tellers and bar musicians, to honestly describe their everyday life, their relationships between a man and a woman. He showed them not as a mysterious peculiarity, but a different culture whose rules can be comprehended, especially with the rich historical knowledge he had.

Ficowski also dealt with the Gypsy Holocaust, a topic conveniently forgotten by everyone else. He translated the inscription from the obelisk in Auschwitz into Romani, depicted their martyrdom, which did not only come down to death camps, but also to various random places of execution. Another huge merit of his is championing of Papusza, an ordinary caravan woman with an enormous poetic sensitivity.

He once told me about an event from the period when he was a young boy. Boys at his school in Warsaw organised an anti-Jewish demonstration against two of their colleagues. The boys said that no one would sit down unless they leave the classroom. Without a second thought, Jerzy sat down with the two boys at the same desk, and since the teaching staff at that time were good people, the crisis was defused.

But it was also a matter of his personal courage and a choice he made for the rest of his life. To me he will remain the custodian of memory of the generation forged by the Second World War. To me, Jerzy Ficowski was a guide to two non-existent worlds: the culture of Polish Gypsies and the culture of Polish Jews. Ficowski upset this dullness.

He would guide you through the alleys of Drohobycz, forgotten Jewish cemeteries and Schulzian gardens overgrown with burdock; he would lead you along the paths of Gypsy caravans. Only today have we finally come to see how much ahead of his times he was. Long before the subject of tolerance appeared in the public discourse and the attitude to the stranger became a criterion of openness in the democratic society, Ficowski would put the stranger at the centre.

He was like a vaccine against xenophobia and nationalism, of which I would later have an opportunity to find out. He followed his own path in both poetry and his other literary passions, in selecting his topics and protagonists. He did not try to endear himself to anyone, did not look for contact with people. Nationality: Polish.

Born: Warsaw, 4 September Education: Studied sociology and philosophy at the University of Warsaw, Family: Married 1 Wanda Komala in divorcedtwo daughters; 2 married Elzbieta Bussold inone jerzy ficowski biography channel. Career: Traveled with Gypsy caravans, ; worked with Mazowsze Polish national song and dance ensemble Cyganie polscy.

Galazka z drzewa slonca folklore. Editor, Republika marzen: Utwory rozproszone, opowiadania, fragmenty, eseje, rysunki. Frank Corliss Jr. In the work of Jerzy Ficowski the issue of the Holocaust belongs to a larger whole. The unsubmissive writer, whose writing used to be forbidden by official censorship, speaks up about the injustice suffered by the representatives of national minorities and also tries to preserve the heritage of the multicultural Second Republic of Poland He voices his determined protest against extermination as well as against all forms of persecutions and of destroying human dignity.

The inconceivable crimes committed during World War II led to the collapse of the order of the world in which various ethnic communities used to coexist in harmony. The ghastly heritage of intolerance also loomed over the postwar reality. In Ficowski's writing the same fundamental objection also concerns the oblivion to the fate of the Jews, Ukrainians, and Gypsies.

In moral terms those crimes have not been paid for sufficiently. In one case history is the source of threat. On the one hand, in a series of drastic images, Ficowski uncovers the truth about the twentieth-century history, but on the other he embarks on a search for a poetic Arcadia.

Jerzy ficowski biography channel: The article presents Jerzy Ficowski as

Ficowski focuses on the Holocaust issue both in his poetry and in prose. In the former the narrator speaks of a village appearing in a glimpse in which the dead victims of extermination spend their vacations. The topography of that place is precarious and the status of that ephemeral world is unclear. The phantasms connected with the childhood memories appear in a dream aura.

The construction of time and space, as well as the language of metaphors and discursive comments, makes it possible to juxtapose that eminent short story with Bruno Schultz's prose. In "Not Only Stupid, But Also an Abraham" the mad protagonist enthusiastically welcomes the deportation of the Jews to the execution place that he perceives as a journey to the Promised Land.

In the face of the crime that achieves unification through death the categories of wisdom and stupidity are no longer valid.

Jerzy ficowski biography channel: Regions of the Great

This work also constitutes a penetrating study of fear and uncertainty. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item. Polish poet, writer and translator. Jerzy Ficowski, Warsaw Poland Biography and works [ edit ]. Selected publications [ edit ]. References [ edit ].

Jerzy ficowski biography channel: Jerzy Ficowski is possibly

External links [ edit ]. Authority control databases. MusicBrainz Museum of Modern Art. Toggle the table of contents.